White Fire

by John Oxenham

The ice being broken with the factious ones, Blair and Stuart and Evans, with Matti still necessary as interpreter, though they were all rapidly picking up words and phrases of the island tongue, paid Ra'a several visits and did their utmost to strengthen the slim foundations of peace.

Ha'o and his people, however, declined any active intercourse with the rebels, and never ceased to warn the white men to be on their guard, asserting that their present amenableness was only assumed and would be thrown off as soon as no more was to be got by it. Blair judged that likely enough, but gave no sign of it, and treated the others as though he believed them in every way worthy of confidence. And Ha'o and his people meanwhile went on steadily replenishing their houses, and constructing the weapons without which they felt but half men and wholly insecure.

The mission-houses were completed and furnished. The farmyard was transferred from the bows of the Torch to suitable premises ashore, and what with the discontented bellowings of John Bull—who was always wanting something he hadn't got, though what it was neither he nor any one else could make out—and the mellower remonstrances of his more thoughtful consort, and the satisfied gruntings and squeakings of the delighted piglets and their mother, and the bleating of the goats, and the crowings and cluckings of cocks and hens, and the gabbling of geese in the river pools, the little settlement began to assume a most home-like appearance.

The ladies rejoiced in the feel of solid earth once more, and discovered endless delights in the nearer woods and along the beach. Limits, however, had to be placed on their wanderings, till assurance of good intent on the part of the outsiders was made doubly sure or proved entirely worthless.

Their nearest neighbours were the atoll community. These, not unnaturally, felt somewhat doubtful as to the permanence of their security among the discordant elements around them, and looked anxiously to the white men for protection. Left alone they would undoubtedly have been slaughtered and eaten out of hand, for human flesh was still the choicest dish where the only other variations from a vegetarian diet were occasional wood-pigeons, paraquets, and an unreliable choice of fish.

So far as Ha'o and his people were concerned, the atoll men were safe enough for the present and until cause might arise. They had been bed-fellows in misfortune and had shared a common deliverance, and so they were allowed to work beside the others in the taro swamp and to take their allowance of the fruits of the earth.

But there was a spirit of fear and distrust abroad—the fear that walks by night and makes light sleepers in palm-thatched houses, and no man went abroad after dark if he could help it.

With no little difficulty Blair succeeded in getting into communication also with the fourth community in the neighbourhood—the sitters on the fence, who were naturally at odds with all the others and would have fared badly but for their numbers, and for the hope each side had of eventually drawing them into their own folds.

They were perhaps more dangerous to approach even than Ra'a. For Ra'a was one, and his men obeyed his words. But these outlanders were many, and each man did what seemed right in his own eyes, and kept on terms with his neighbour and the community simply from motives of safety. In going among them, therefore, the risks were multiplied. They took all that was offered, however, and promised anything that was required of them in hopes of more.

But, obviously, four more or less distinct communities in one district were at least three too many. It was like having four savage dogs at large in one small back yard, and the proper thing to do was to get some of them to move.